Moving to Australia as a progressive in 2016: introduction

Many of my US friends are frightened of the Donald Trump presidency for very good reasons. I have no special insight (less so than them) but the bad and worst cases seem very very frightening to me too, far more so than for a typical Republican or generally conservative government. Some folks I know are considering or actively planning emigration and I greatly sympathise, although I don’t know what I would choose or when I would pursue my choice.

This has caused me to think over what I know about Australia, good, bad, and terrible, Hopefully if you are considering immigrating to Australia you have time and resources and are able to seek out many voices inside and outside Australia. Some of this may also be useful to people who are simply interested in Australia as a place to visit or in Australian news.

I am one person. More specifically I’m a white cis heterosexual partnered mother of young children who works in a well compensated job in the tech industry (in fact for Google, a US company), as does my spouse. I’m able-bodied but not strictly healthy; I have a few acute and chronic illnesses that aren’t disabling at present and I have some experience of being seriously and, once, life-threateningly ill in Australia. I’m Australian-born, I’m a citizen, and I’ve never lived in any other country. My insight is limited, the more so the less these are true of you too. I will try and link to a number of other voices and sources of information in these pieces from other perspectives. I’d be very interested in comparative pieces of all kinds and for many regions and countries!

I honour the Wongal people of the Eora nation, on whose land I live, and I pay my respects to elders both past and present.

Over the next few days, I will be publishing several articles with my best assessment of things you might want to know before you seriously consider moving to Australia as a progressive in 2016, for any reason.

This article is part of my series Moving to Australia as a progressive: